The perfect cure for shell shock

Never mind oysters, its the relaxing life for me at one of Frances best kept secrets, writes Rhiannon Batten

It’s a hard life being an oyster. As well as the danger of being suffocated by an opportunistic mussel, there’s also the chance that a hungry starfish might slowly digest you. Not to mention the damage a drilling winkle or a crab might do. In fact, considering the number of predators waiting to swoop, it seems miraculous that any oysters survive at all. Yet in the Marennes-Oleron region of France, which produces half the country’s oyster output, 50,000 tons of the glossy creatures make it to maturity each year, only to be laid on a plate of ice and slurped down by humans.

The local oysters were pretty safe the week I visited Oleron, however. Though I love the idea of them, my stomach doesn’t. Years of optimistic trial and fateful error have taught me to avoid shellfish. So I left them well alone during my trip, which was a